


Before

by HopeCoppice



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley Was Not Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Gen, Post-Almost Apocalypse (Good Omens), canon-typical relationship ambiguity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 13:35:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29154423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopeCoppice/pseuds/HopeCoppice
Summary: It's not until long after the Apocalypse That Wasn't that Aziraphale asks a question Crowley's been dreading.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 76





	Before

**Author's Note:**

> I know I always say "just a little thinky thing" but that seems to be what I'm writing these days. Enjoy!
> 
> Partially inspired by a few words of this meta: https://cockadoodlebumtits.tumblr.com/post/642012556987351040/i-think-crowley-fell-in-love-with-az-on-the-wall

It's not until a century after the Apocalypse That Wasn't that Aziraphale finally gathers the courage to ask a question Crowley's been dreading since the Beginning.

It's not a surprise, when it comes; he gets plenty of warning in the way that Aziraphale starts fussing over little trinkets scattered around their home. That, of course, only makes Crowley nervous, so he has to start stress-cleaning around him, and by the time Aziraphale finally opens his mouth they've both done a full circuit of the room.

"Crowley," he begins, and falters, "I hope you don't mind my asking, only I've been wondering, well, it's just my own curiosity really, you needn't answer if you'd rather n-"

"Asking what, angel?" He says it as softly, as gently as he can, but Aziraphale still flinches.

"I… I wondered if you might tell me - not that it changes anything, not in the slightest, not for me - but I wondered-" He sighs. "What did you do, Before?"

"Before?" But he knows, won't insult his angel's intelligence by pretending not to know what he means. "Before the Fall."

"Yes." Question asked, Aziraphale drops into a seat like a puppet with its strings cut, and Crowley follows suit for lack of a better idea. "You needn't-"

"I want to, angel. Just… give me a moment. Got to, to, you know… find the words."

Aziraphale waits patiently as Crowley tries to wrestle his thoughts and feelings into some sort of coherent narrative. How can he describe the feeling of forging a star, of flinging it out into the heavens and watching it snag on the exact stretch of empty sky where it belonged?

"I was a starmaker," he tells him simply, "and a general dogsbody during the act of Creation, really. My true calling was to come later, so I just tried out a few little things here and there. Made myself  _ useful, _ " he finishes with a sneer.

"You hadn't been assigned to-?"

"No, I had. I knew what my job would be, it just wouldn't start until the Creation was finished." Crowley sighs. "We Fell before that."

"I'm sorry." Aziraphale looks miserable, twisting his fingers together in a way Crowley suspects means he wants to hold Crowley's hand, but doesn't know if he can. Crowley reaches out and stills the anxious fidgeting, anchoring the two of them in the moment, in their home, in each other. "Is that why you Fell? You had nothing to do?"

"Perhaps. If I'd been busy, if I'd been focused on one task, perhaps I would have asked fewer questions.  _ Won't that creature damage that one, wouldn't they be safer if the poisonous things looked less like the tasty things, couldn't you put that somewhere safe out of reach…" _

"Oh, Crowley. You shouldn't have Fallen just for asking questions." And they both still for a moment, casting their eyes upwards in anticipation of reprisals. Nothing happens, of course. If God was watching, they'd have been punished long ago.

"Well," Crowley concedes, when the moment of danger has passed, "not just for asking questions. When I didn't like the answers, I fell in with a bad crowd. But I don't see how it could have been any different, knowing what I knew about this new world and knowing what my role in it all would be. I was always going to want to protect them."

There's a long, heavy silence as Aziraphale stares through their joined hands, and Crowley realises abruptly what he's said.

"To protect them.  _ Crowley.  _ You always said you had no particular rank-"

"In Hell, angel. I had no particular rank in Hell."

"But I thought that meant you were a typical rank-and-file angel, too, because why wouldn't Hell recognise your Heavenly standing?"

"Why  _ would  _ they, angel? If anything, it'd count  _ against-" _

"Your rank, Crowley, in Heaven. Will you-? That is, would you tell me-?"

"I was…" There's no getting around it now; Aziraphale will know the exact height he fell from, the precise weight of the responsibility he abdicated. "I was a Principality, angel. Charged with the protection of the Earth."

"The same as me," Aziraphale whispers, his fingers tracing the joints of Crowley's own with something like reverence.  _ Wonder,  _ Crowley realises,  _ as if I'm something wondrous. _

"Well," Aziraphale remarks after a moment, with a sort of forced lightness, "I doubt we'd have got along, if you'd stayed Upstairs. Might never have met, even, if they'd had us on opposite shifts. But it must have been hard for you, curbing all those protective instincts in the early days."

"Hm. Yes. Quite a struggle," Crowley murmurs, moving in to press a kiss to the temple of the very first being he ever chose to protect. "But I had someone to watch over."

"Oh?" Aziraphale looks up, then, catches his eye and turns a very fetching shade of pink. "Oh. Oh, I never- goodness me, it should have been obvious, really, shouldn't it?"

"Better that it wasn't," Crowley reminds him. "Anything else you want to know?"

"No, I think that's enough for now," Aziraphale tells him. "Thank you for telling me."

"I'm an open book, me. One only you get to read, mind."

"A priceless first edition," Aziraphale agrees fondly, "slightly foxed."

"Oi! Less of that, I do know what it means. Be calling me a reading copy next."

"I would never!" And Aziraphale looks so outraged at the very thought that Crowley's inclined to believe him. It stirs something warm and sentimental in his cold, demonic heart.

"Good. Well, if that's settled, perhaps I might tempt you to a spot of lunch?"

Aziraphale smiles with all the radiance a celestial being ought to possess, and Crowley feels his own lips curve in response. 

"Tempt away, dearest fiend of mine. Tempt away."

**Author's Note:**

> Come and find me on Tumblr @cockadoodlebumtits


End file.
